Characters or marks that are shown on the outer surfaces of industrial products are subject to contacts of human hands so that they fade very quickly, thus reducing their service lives. A common example of such a problem is computer keyboards which comprises a number of movable keys or blocks or pushbuttons each having a particular character or mark provided thereon for indication distinction purposes. To solve the quick fading problem of the characters or marks on industrial products, a laser marker is adapted to form characters or marks on the industrial products, such as the computer keyboards, by means of a laser beam etching or engraving surfaces of the products. The characters or marks so formed are in general recessed with respect to the surface on which they are formed so as to prevent the characters or marks from abrasion and fading.
Conventionally, the laser marker that is used to mark the key blocks of the keyboard comprises a work piece carrier table and a laser device controlled by a computer. In operation, "blank" keyboards are manually positioned by an operator in a one by one fashion onto the carrier table that is located below the laser device and then the operator uses the laser device to mark the blank keyboard. The keyboard hat is so processed is then manually moved away. This completes the character marking operation of the keyboard.
Such a conventional laser character marker has some evident drawbacks and is quite impractical. For example, the operator has to watch the computer that controls the laser device and the related parameter settings of the laser. The operator also needs to be careful about the position and orient the keyboard in the carrier table and has to move the keyboards so processed to a collection shelf one by one after the marking operation. This is quite inconvenient in operation and the precision of the marking operation is subject to influence of human factor. Accident may occur to physically damage the operator in positioning the keyboard into the laser marker or removal of the keyboard therefrom due to for example injury caused by the laser beam. Further, the manual operation makes it difficult to enhance the character marking operation efficiency. In addition, for keyboards of different specifications, the locations of the key blocks that are to be processed by the character marking operation may on the keyboard may be different from keyboard to keyboard so that the difference in the specifications of the keyboards requires the carrier table to be moved in different ways and automation of both marking operation on the work pieces of different specification and forming characters of different styles on the keyboards is in general impossible. Thus, it is not possible to increase the manufacturing efficiency of the keyboards and the cost cannot be cut down.
It is thus desirable to have a control system for the laser marker which overcomes the drawbacks encountered in the conventional laser marker systems.